


velvet over veridium

by Sasskarian



Series: Glitter: A Modern Thedas Tale [1]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Family, Gen, Hawke Family Feels, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Other, Templar Carver Hawke
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-24
Updated: 2017-09-24
Packaged: 2019-01-04 13:05:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12169452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sasskarian/pseuds/Sasskarian
Summary: Once upon a time, Carver Hawke ran away from home to be a templar and Bethany Hawke was a top student at the College of Magi. Once upon a time, Anders was hopelessly in love with the Hawkes, and Varric Tethras was looking for a good story to get him out from under his brother's shady connections.And once, in the middle of a Hightown manor, Marian Hawke slowly fell to pieces.





	velvet over veridium

**Author's Note:**

> How Glitterverse began, courtesy of Hawke throwing a curveball at me in Chapter 2. Anyone who ever says writers have control over their characters? Is either too hopeful or lying through their teeth.
> 
> Referenced alcoholism and substance abuse

If anyone had ever accused Marian Hawke of being a reasonable adult human being, she might have laughed at them. No, she'd have pointed and _then_ laughed at them. But under all her bluster, and all her immature jokes, her dirty one-liners and cheesy pick-up lines, there _was_ an adult hidden somewhere.

It wasn’t the same sort of adult as her twin brother, he of the hipster-sock-cap-and-unironic-skinny-jeans, who could charm the birds from the trees with a song, with his security-guard hands and healer’s heart. Nor was it the little-mother-adult of her sister, the one who smiled like velvet over veridium, who spent long nights buried in crumbling Circle texts and still had a cup of tea and a warm hug for whoever needed it.

Her little brother had always been too adult, and that was half his problem— even as a kid, Carver had looked on the world with grown-up eyes. Mama used to tease him that he’d been born half in the grave already, holding sarcasm in one hand and cynicism in the other. And then one night, late, after she’d cried herself hollow while Carver packed his things for templar recruitment, she’d looked at Marian and said, “I wish I had been joking.”

_I wish I had been joking._

_Oh, Carver._

“I’m sorry?” Marian repeated, leaning heavily on her door. Surely this was an ill-timed joke, a farce. Or the product of a hangover and the lingering taste of whatever cheap-ass whiskey dive she’d found herself in the night before.

The templar recruit started to roll his eyes when his partner— superior?— cleared his throat. It was one of those _significant_ exchanges, the sort that Varric liked to write into his films. A clever viewer would see it and feel like they knew something, or they’d leave a serial with a handful of clues to find their friends and dissect them all together. Marian had taken a class on directing, mostly to spend a couple of hours a week with Varric where they could snicker and pretend they were better than the wide-eyed idiots around them; it annoyed her that some pieces of that class seemed to have seeped in after all, if she was noticing film-like undercurrents.

“Mistress Hawke,” the older one edged in front of his trainee, “your brother has been injured in the line of duty. We’ve been sent to take you to the hospital.” He paused. “Ah, if you’d like to go.”

Marian’s ears burned with shame because her first thought, right behind _of course I want to go_ was, _what has Carver been telling these people that they’d even question that?_

It was the adult in Marian that took over at that thought, that smiled at the templars and asked if she could have a few minutes to gather her essentials.

_Sarcasm in one hand—_

It was the adult in her that pulled a mental list from somewhere, that grabbed her house keys, her cell phone, her wallet.

_—cynicism in the other—_

It was the adult in her that allowed the younger, now-contrite, templar to help her into the terribly official-looking black car, that studied the creamy leather seats and the city of Kirkwall as it passed outside, that didn’t allow her hands to shake as she texted Varric and Anders, Garrett and Bethany.

_-half in the grave already—_

It was the adult in Marian that held on to composure with slippery fingertips while the rest of her wept and screamed inside the iron-will barriers in the backseat of a military vehicle with one thought circling in her head:

_Carver._

***

“Miss Hawke,” the doctor who strode out of the bustling emergency room zeroed in on Marian with ease. Marian was relieved— and a little amazed— at how much competence she projected, white lab coat swirling around her knees as her powerful strides brought her across the room to seize Hawke’s hand. “I’m your brother’s surgeon He’s being prepped for the operation right now—”

“Surgery?” Hawke asked, eyebrows climbing. “Surely there’s a mage on staff?” She didn’t want to admit it, but growing up with Garrett and Anders (since she'd never really had a talent for healing, herself) had given her a knee-jerk repulsion to the more mundane methods of medicine. With a disgusted inner sigh, adult-Marian took back control and asked, quieter, “Surgery?”

Fortunately, the doctor didn’t seem to take offense at her slip and nodded crisply as she guided both of them through the swinging doors.

“Carver was injured during an incident that the Order won’t give me full details on,” she said, effortlessly steering Hawke to the elevator. “Details would help but what really matters is that the injury is in a delicate place in his spine,” she ignored Hawke’s pained gasp, “and that he didn’t receive immediate attention. It took about an hour, hour and a half, before the rest of his team caught up with him. That makes this tricky.”

“Tricky?” Hawke said over the _ping_ of the elevator, struggling for calm over the pounding in her chest and head.

As they neared a smaller, more private waiting room, the doctor’s steps slowed, and Hawke looked into her face— and wished she hadn’t. Learning to shape her own face and voice to lie convincingly on film had taught Hawke too much about reading them, and what she saw… There was strain and worry there, along with some fading indignation, and laid over it all was a professional detachment that Hawke knew should have been reassuring but really, really wasn’t.

The doctor faced her. “If he’d gotten treatment right away, a mage healer would have been enough to keep him stable until he reached us. As it is, the damage is too old for a mage. If we’re very lucky, and very good at our jobs, we can save his legs and he might walk again.”

Hawke shoved her hands in her pockets, hating that she couldn’t stop— even for a minute, _this_ minute, too somber and heartstopping— thinking about life like film, and that when she spoke, it was after an appropriately dramatic pause.

“And are you? Very lucky and very good?”

When the doctor didn’t answer right away, Hawke pinned her with her best give-me-that-coffee-you-idiotic-intern stare. Finally, the doctor gestured at one of the padded benches, tugged at the hem of her scrubs, and said, “I’ll let you know.”

***

“Maker’s fucking _grace,_ Hawke,” Varric swore as she blinked, trying to bring him into focus. When she could reasonably see him, he rocked back on his heels, craggy face scrunched up with concern. “You look like warmed-over mabari shit.”

“I look better than I feel, then,” she said, trying for a smile. It came out weak and trembling, like the rest of her, and had him settling a wide hand on her shoulder. She couldn’t meet his eyes— Varric had seen her one too many times after a bad night and knew what to look for. “What time is it?”

“Almost one in the morning, birdie,” Anders said from somewhere to her left. With a loud crack, she turned her neck to look at him. He reached a hand out and settled it over hers and if he noticed the shaking in it, well, neither of them acknowledged it. “Bethany should be getting into the Kirkwall airport soon. Garrett’s already there waiting for her.”

Dully, Marian nodded, curling back up in the tailbone-bruising chair; padding or no, twelve hours in the same position had done her back no favors. The next paycheck Varric cut her was being invested in the hospital— no one should have to be miserable _and_ uncomfortable. Assuming she could even get a job soon which, if she were honest with herself, didn't seem very likely. Money went into a bottle almost as soon as she had it and she told herself the same lie, again and again: last one. This is the last one. But like all addicts, that last one never came.

“Has there been an update?” she mumbled through a yawn. When neither of them spoke immediately, her eyes snapped open and she glued them to Varric as he shuffled over to the bench across from her. Anders’ grip on her hand tightened briefly. “Guys?”

“He’s out of surgery,” Varric said quietly, a note of reproach under the worry. He'd noticed, then, that the bags under her eyes weren't just worry. “I was getting here as the doctor was telling Garrett and Anders— you were pretty deeply asleep, so no one wanted to wake you.”

Anders squeezed her hand, and brought it to his lips. “The doctor said something about being lucky? Said you'd know what she meant.”

A breath Hawke didn’t know she’d been holding since the doctor had swished away in her lab coat whooshed out of her lungs, and her sole coherent thought for the better part of the next hour was _Thank the Maker._

***

Carver looked _small_ , his unruly black curls stark against the too-clean-hospital-white of the pillow; he was pale under his tan, worn thin and somehow _frail_ , and everything in Marian Hawke wanted to scream at the _wrongness_ of it, of seeing him so… broken. She would rearrange the stars themselves in a heartbeat if it meant Carver sat up and sneered at her for daring to care about him.

For a moment, Hawke didn’t see the kid brother who’d tripped along in her shadow, adoring and resentful in equal measures. She didn’t see the gangly teenager, all elbows and knees and long limbs Mama swore he’d never grow into.

She didn’t see the templar he’d become.

All Hawke could see was her eight-year-old self staring down at ruddy-cheeked babies with thunderclouds of black fuzz on their heads and feeling her heart swell with instant, absolute love— and the terrifying knowledge that she would protect them at any cost.

“Oh, Carv,” Bethany gasped from behind her, hesitating on the threshold of the room before flying into it.

“You okay, birdie?” Anders murmured, his arm winding around her hip. Good ol’ Anders, Marian thought, a bitter taste somewhere in the back of her throat. Always there. Always grounding her, picking her up when she slid too far into vices. Never far enough to lose herself but far enough that she could taste oblivion once in awhile, could drown out the pain with whatever was at hand. Always with that small, disappointed smile and that gentle kiss that she’d once thought they could build a life on.

Hawke leaned down and brushed one of Carver’s curls from his brow, trying not to notice the way her fingers trembled. Garrett had his arms around Bethany, almost dwarfing her with his size, and she was chuffing one of Carver’s hands between her own. They looked so little alike, the twins— Bethany was all sunbeam-slender and shining smiles, with a core of steel buried somewhere under her soft heart. And Carver was long and broad, with a jawline it had taken him twenty years to grow into, and a face that was never immobile even in its mocking. Especially in his mocking.

But here, with Bethie’s forehead pressed to his and Carver so still, so _wounded_ , Hawke finally saw that the profile was the same. The same high forehead, same blade-sharp nose. The smear of freckles across all their faces, like the kaddis warpaint of old. Identical messy Hawke curls, black as night and twice as thick, marked them all as related, pieces of a whole that was slowly, inexorably falling apart.

And some part of her, some twisted, anxious part, whispered that it was somehow her fault.

Marian turned away and buried her face in Ander’s shoulder, hiding her tears in the fold of his jacket; she didn’t protest as he led her out of the room, as he settled her on his thigh and tangled his hand in her sleep-mussed hair. She became aware of her soft whimpers when Anders pressed his chin to her head and hummed a low Ferelden lullaby—

_—”Mare!” Carver swatted at her hand, his nose wrinkled in disgust. “I'm not a baby anymore.”_

_“So you're too old for Flying Frostbacks, then?” Marian settled on the edge of his bed, one hand stroking her chin in a move worthy of a movie supervillain. “Well, no hope for it, Carv.”_

_His blue eyes narrowed as she tucked the sheets up under his chin and Bethany snuggled into his side, already mostly-asleep. “No help for what?”_

_“I guess you're just too old for lullabies and stories, then,” Hawke said, clasping her hand over her heart with a flair of melodrama. “No more Andraste’s Mabari, no more Song of the Champion.” She tsked, smoothing out the covers and trying to hide a smile as he fidgeted. “I suppose that means no more Cory-fear-us Corypheus either.”_

_“Okay, fine,” he grumbled, all of six years old and already a grumpy old man. All he needed to enhance his acerbic voice was a cane to shake and a lawn to shoo children off of._ _“ Sing.” —_

Slowly, Hawke’s tears dried. Her nose ran like a fountain and her face was tight, wrung clean of any spare moisture, and she wished with all her might that her fingers were curled around a bottle instead of Anders’ collar. His skin was warm under her touch, his pulse thrumming against the pads of her fingers. Lips brushed the shell of her ear and she drew a shaky breath, the way it burned its way into cramped lungs reminding her that she still lived, for now.

_Oh, Mama, I wish you were here._

“I should have protected him,” she murmured, hating the way Anders’ touch was a balm on her nerves. It wasn’t fair of her to keep using him. Carver had always told her she was selfish, didn’t care enough about people around her. Maybe he was right. “I should have _been there._ ”

_Maker_ , but she’d forgive him every damn argument if he’d just poke his head out the door and call her selfish again. Hell, he could snarl insults about her magic, about her career, about the way she drank, and she wouldn't care. It would mean he was awake, alive, still within her grasp, and she'd take every insult and more with a smile.

“Birdie, he’s a templar,” Anders replied, keeping his voice down— the door to Carver’s room was still open, after all. “And a man grown.”

Hawke sniffled, a tear tracking down her cheek again, and she hated herself a little more for each one. “That doesn’t mean anything. He’s still my baby brother.”

Anders was spared trying to reason with her some more when someone called, “Hawke? Marian Hawke?”

Hawke looked up to see a tall, sturdy-looking nurse holding a clipboard and looking at her like he could identify her by a stamp on her forehead. _Or a tag around your toe,_ a silky, oily voice whispered from the back of her head. Irritably, she shoved the anxiety away and wiped her nose on her sleeve. “Yes?”

“Your brother had you down as his emergency contact,” the nurse said— Hawke dimly saw that his nametag read Nathan before her view was full of paperwork. Hawke had time for the warmth in her heart to spread— _Carver had me as his emergency contact?_ — before Nathan leveled a look at her that made her fledgling hope wither. It wasn't condemnation in his gaze, or anger, or blame— all the things she'd glimpsed in Varric's for that half-breath that he'd seen under her mask. And it wasn't something as choking as pity, either. It was just professionalism and distance.

“He’s going to be in intense physical therapy for a long while, Miss Hawke,” Nathan said, his voice so unbearably gentle. “I suggest convincing him to move to either Kirkwall or Starkhaven— there are good therapists here in the Marches. With the right care, he'll walk again.”

“He can stay with me,” Garrett said from the doorway, and Marian jumped, mashing Anders’ nose against her shoulder; she hadn’t even heard him approach. “I live close enough to the hospital that I can make sure he has the support he needs.”

“Very well.” Nathan inclined his well-groomed head towards Garrett. “There’ll be some paperwork to fill out. If you’ll follow me?”

Garrett’s golden eyes— Bethany’s eyes, their _father’s_ eyes— locked on Hawke’s. “I’ll take care of him, Mare,” he said softly, a small, sad smile hiding under his short black beard. “Just like I’ll find a way to take care of you, too.” He cupped her head in one big hand and Hawke found her nose pressed against her older twin’s collar, surrounded by the familiar smell of his cologne, of coffee and the faint, indefinable scent of _home._

Hawke sniffled wetly and Garrett’s hand squeezed on the back of her neck. “We’ll be okay, Mare,” he whispered, pressing a bristly kiss against her temple— and then he was gone, following in the nurse’s wake to take over the role of caretaker for the Hawke family. The role Hawke had held, until she’d fallen.

_Damn and blast, Hawke,_ she thought to herself, scrubbing at her eyes. _How do we get ourselves out of this?_

***

“Hawke?”

She turned and saw Varric approaching, cautious and unsure. The dwarf had been her best friend— and at times, her most-argued-with friend— for the better part of four years. He was practically family in every way that counted, and when he reached them, Hawke’s arms curled around him as easily as she’d folded herself around Anders.

“I need your help, Varric,” she said, quiet and ashamed but growing stronger with every breath.

“Anything for you, Hawke,” came the reply, and a sob choked her. With some struggle, Marian embraced the adult she’d been playing the part of for the better part of two days, and looked at her best friends, knowing she was about to take a risk that could ruin this small safe haven forever.

Hawke wet her lips before speaking. “Carver doesn’t want for _anything_.” He blinked at her and when she looked into his face the way she’d looked at the surgeon, she saw him reaching for a comforting lie. Or maybe a pseudo-agreement, the sort he was oh, so good at spinning to those who didn’t know him.

“I mean it, Varric,” Hawke said, her voice cold and broken open with the truths she’d run from for so long. “I know about those connections you’ve tried not to tap. I know that Bartrand does things that are legal only in a fantasy universe.” Varric flinched and she hated herself for it, but she was coming to understand: this was who Marian Hawke really was.

Under the two-bit acting gigs, under the winning smile and the magical talent that could have gotten her a full ride all the way to Tevinter, Hawke was a person who wasn’t afraid to stick her hands through someone’s heart and _twist_ if it protected her and hers. Varric was one of hers, but Carver... 

“You don’t know what you’re asking, Hawke,” Varric said, ghosts in his eyes and a plea in his normally-smooth voice.

“Oh, but I do,” she answered him, voice gone soft and silky and Maker, but she hated this. It read like a scene in one of Varric’s scripts, all undertones and film noir, and she was playing the part of the villain as if she’d been born to it. Maybe she had. “The Coterie, the Carta, the Merchants. I don’t care who you have to bribe, murder, steal from, or plead to. My brother is _immune_ to them. I don’t give a damn if he is the only templar in Kirkwall they don’t fuck with, but he _will_ be safe.”

Some of the warmth Varric had always looked at her with dimmed, coals now instead of a welcoming blaze. It turned his face hard, and in that moment, under the harsh hospital light, Varric looked like a stranger. “And in return?” he spat, face twisting up in fury and hurt. “What do I get for sticking my hands back into that shitstorm?”

The answer was so simple, and still so complex at the same time. “Me,” she said simply. “In two months, you get me… and all the access to the ancient Hawke records of the Champion you’ve been angling for since we met.” She waited a beat, as was only appropriate in the hook of the scene. “You can finally make the movie of your life.”

That got his attention. The anger slid off his face and he narrowed those brown eyes at her, calculating. Under that lovable rogue exterior, Varric was just the same as Hawke: he wasn’t afraid of getting his hands dirty, either. And just then, he looked furious enough under the calculation to use her the same way she was using him.  _What a pair,_ she thought, but then, they'd always been that. Hawke and Tethras against the world, back to back from day one-- and neither too afraid to be cruel to be kind, even to each other.

“Why two months?” he finally asked.

Hawke felt Anders’ hand on her shoulder and she took a deep breath, shrugging him off. She needed to stand on her own, for once, as shaky as her legs had been since her mother and uncle’s murder. And it wasn't fair to Anders to keep stringing him along when they both knew they weren't going to work out.

“You have to wait.” Hawke took a deep breath and let him read the truth in her eyes. “I’m finally gonna see that counselor you’ve been hounding me over.”


End file.
